Risks of the Fetal Heart Rate Monitoring
A big risk of external of internal fetal heart rate monitoring is the appearance of false negative or even false positive results. As you can figure out by yourself, a false positive result is when the test comes up positive however the results are wrong, i.e. when results are interpreted as indicating distress however there’s no fetal distress. Unfortunately, this situation can occur in a delivery by vacuum or forceps or vacuum and in a cesarean section. Extensive medical research has proven that electronic fetal monitoring is extremely sensitive and highly prone to giving false positive results. On the other hand, a false negative result is when the test says the baby is healthy however the baby is born with some problems. This kind of mistake is less frequent. Furthermore, research is starting to indicate that a large number of these children have a hidden abnormality which started before labor and is responsible for the problems after birth.
Some other not-so-serious risks of this process can come up in case internal monitoring is necessary. Internal fetal monitoring is used during a normal birth where the baby delivery team is having no problems of keeping the child on the monitor or the child’s reaction does not look great on the less accurate form of external fetal monitoring or simply EFM. It is also used for high risk births and represents a valuable tool for measuring strength of contractions and baby’s well-being. This procedure requires a tiny wire to be placed right beneath the sensitive skin of the fetal scalp. This results in a tiny break in the baby’s skin which generally heals without leaving any problem. But keep in mind that in some cases can end up in skin infection or even bleeding. To enter the uterus, the fetal scalp electrode (and the internal pressure transducer in case it is being used) must go through the vagina. And as you probably already know, the vagina is basically full of bacteria. Usually, these bacteria are not dangerous however putting these delicate instruments can sometimes introduce new bacteria into the uterine cavity and cause an infection known as the chorioamnionitis. It is an inflammation of the fetal membranes which occurs because of the bacterial infection. So, this infection is usually responsible for fever during labor and child birth. Luckily, in general this infection is treatable and hardly ever ends up in any long-term negative consequences for the baby and mom. Furthermore, it has to be underlined that while using these sophisticated yet simple medical instruments increases the risk for chorioamnionitis to a certain extent, it’s not clear whether the instrument is responsible for the infection.
The increase in infection rate can be because of the fact that internal monitors are more usually used during difficult and long labors which are usually connected with preexisting infection. In a great number of different situations, both internal and external monitors relay the same information to the baby delivery team.
Leave a Comment May 29, 2010